Much has been written of the negative impacts of rapidly rising immigration on the housing and the affordability crises and on essential services like healthcare. Now, the negative effect on the economy is being analyzed, and a previously unfamiliar term is appearing to describe it – “population trap”.
Appropriately, two economists from the National Bank of Canada (NBC) begin a report on the topic with Oxford’s definition: “Population trap: A situation where no increase in living standards is possible, because the population is growing so fast that all available savings are needed to maintain the existing capital-labour ratio.”